G
gilliam
Guest
I normally don’t go that far into domestic politics for a variety of reasons, but in this case the two issues are intrinsically related. I’ve noted (as has Bill) what’ll happen to the region if the US more or less abandons Iraq. Those remarks occurred within the context of calls by Democratic members of Congress to set a timetable for withdrawl, but I think they’re still quite applicable to what is essentially a withdrawl so that the GOP can attempt to make some political headway in time for the 2006 mid-term elections. But let me just touch on one other point that I haven’t really talked about before.
If the US withdraws and Iraq collapses and the Middle East destabilizes as a result, support among both the American public and the political establishment for any future military intervention is going to be out of the question for the immediate future. That’s bad from where I’m standing because, for all the discussion of de-militarizing the war on terrorism, al-Qaeda is still out there, a point I would think would be rather painfully obvious by everything that’s happened this summer in Ayodhya, London, and Sharm el-Sheikh among other locations worldwide. Given that the US withdrawl from Iraq will result in a recruiting bonanza for the group as well as an affirmation that everything bin Laden and his acolytes have been saying is correct, it puts the organization in a position where they can basically attack the United States with impunity without fear of anything save 1990s-style arrests and extraditions or token reprisals. The military option, in other words, will have been removed from the table for the immediate future during a period when it will be most needed. Moreover, it is quite likely that the organization will be able to nullify major US responses to small-scale attacks on our soil by framing them with in the context of “retaliation” for what the US did to Iraq.
Another likely outcome of this process will be that the Arab reform and democratization project will be dead. The “Muslim democracy = Islamists” script has already been written for Iraq and will be held up as proof of the futility of democracy in the Middle East if not in the Muslim world as a whole. So where exactly does that leave us if we get hit with say, what Zarqawi wanted to do to the good people Amman?
I honestly don’t know and that worries me. Absent the political willingness to deploy conventional military forces in the Middle East, however, it is not altogether unreasonable to suggest that at some future date the US might retaliate with weapons of mass destruction in some fashion in response to a future terrorist incident. I don’t consider that to be an ideal future by any means, but I do feel that the likelihood of it occurring increases by a factor of ten if the US ditches Iraq out of domestic political considerations.
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If the US withdraws and Iraq collapses and the Middle East destabilizes as a result, support among both the American public and the political establishment for any future military intervention is going to be out of the question for the immediate future. That’s bad from where I’m standing because, for all the discussion of de-militarizing the war on terrorism, al-Qaeda is still out there, a point I would think would be rather painfully obvious by everything that’s happened this summer in Ayodhya, London, and Sharm el-Sheikh among other locations worldwide. Given that the US withdrawl from Iraq will result in a recruiting bonanza for the group as well as an affirmation that everything bin Laden and his acolytes have been saying is correct, it puts the organization in a position where they can basically attack the United States with impunity without fear of anything save 1990s-style arrests and extraditions or token reprisals. The military option, in other words, will have been removed from the table for the immediate future during a period when it will be most needed. Moreover, it is quite likely that the organization will be able to nullify major US responses to small-scale attacks on our soil by framing them with in the context of “retaliation” for what the US did to Iraq.
Another likely outcome of this process will be that the Arab reform and democratization project will be dead. The “Muslim democracy = Islamists” script has already been written for Iraq and will be held up as proof of the futility of democracy in the Middle East if not in the Muslim world as a whole. So where exactly does that leave us if we get hit with say, what Zarqawi wanted to do to the good people Amman?
I honestly don’t know and that worries me. Absent the political willingness to deploy conventional military forces in the Middle East, however, it is not altogether unreasonable to suggest that at some future date the US might retaliate with weapons of mass destruction in some fashion in response to a future terrorist incident. I don’t consider that to be an ideal future by any means, but I do feel that the likelihood of it occurring increases by a factor of ten if the US ditches Iraq out of domestic political considerations.
Read it all